


CSAU

by Erinwolf1997



Category: Cobra Starship, Fall Out Boy, Hush Sound, Paramore, Twenty One Pilots, fun.
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Catholic School, Crushes, F/M, Gen, Ghosts, Moving, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Small Towns, Teacher-Student Relationship, gabe is the ghost if you're wondering, new kid in town
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-14
Updated: 2016-12-02
Packaged: 2018-05-06 15:58:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5423156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Erinwolf1997/pseuds/Erinwolf1997
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>May had been the hottest month of the year, and she'd been forced to pack everything into a single suitcase. Hours of driving later, through cities and towns, then down highways lined with endless roads of trees, her family stepped out of the car in the outskirts of a little town named Huddersfield.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> CSAU is probably a working title, just I've been working on this so long without a title that I can't refer to it as anything else but "CSAU".
> 
> Currently still in progress after nearly a year and ~27k words (yikes).

NEW SCHOOL YEAR, NEW YOU:

 

  These words were bright, painted on cardboard signs in nearly every major department store. They hinted at excitement, starting fresh, going back to school happy, not nervous and miserable.

 

  Her bedroom was still depersonalized, much unlike the one in her old house. A stack of CDs lay on the bedside table, and that was about it. She'd spent the empty summer catching up on schoolwork before they'd moved here. Because she was transferring to a new high school this year, she couldn't do much more than countless pages of over-the-summer English homework, (which wasn't too bad; the assignment was to analyze a song and write an essay on its message) excessive Algebra, and transfer paperwork.

 

  May had been the hottest month of the year, and she'd been forced to pack everything into a single suitcase. Hours of driving later, through cities and towns, then down highways lined with endless roads of trees, her family stepped out of the car in the outskirts of a little town named Huddersfield. Huddersfield, run down, once an agricultural hotspot, was now filled mostly with uninhabited churches and dry corner liquor stores. Huddersfield had no shopping malls, one park, and was right on the border of two major sports teams' territories, which,  according to her father, caused at least one serious bar fight a year.

 

  Huddersfield had one elementary school, and two high schools. There was Da Vinci High School, the one with the pretentious name and the pretentious parents who focused more on arts than academics. Da Vinci was at the top of a hill, barely in city limits. The more accessible route to college and a paying career was Saint Valentine's. This school was still private, this time Catholic, with tuition slightly cheaper than Da Vinci's. Her parents destined her to this school: 1,500 students in a hundred year old building.

 

  It's not that she hated the idea, or the town, really, just when her delighted parents took a detour and boasted, "Hey, look, Erin, that's where you'll be in September!", she didn't exactly feel like smiling, not even when one of the students alone outside skimmed her gaze. Instead she pressed her face against the glass of the window, and took her gaze away from the tall building with its bell tower and brick sidewalks.


	2. Chapter 2

Her thrift store alarm clock made a painful sound as she was thrown from her sleep into a dark and unfamiliar Monday morning. It blinked as its siren erupted, and she hid from the responsibility for a few seconds, scared to hit the snooze button, scared that her escapism tactics would just worsen if she decided to go back to sleep.

The blankets came off, and the mild late summer morning hit her bare, unshaved thighs. On the other side of the bed, folded neatly, was a uniform, a black skirt and white button-up. She grabbed for it, destroying the careful, ironed folds, weakly rushing to the bathroom.

After the uniform was on, she admired her new look in an excited clarity. The dark pleated skirt wrapped around her hips loosely. There was room to grow into it, even though she'd stopped growing in middle school. She brushed the simple white shirt down, smoothing it down her side, silently criticizing the school's preference for a uniform that was so easy to stain. She tied her hair up in a simple bun that accentuated her round face and doll-like eyes. A disgruntled, glum and empty face stared back at her from the gold-rimmed mirror.

The rest of the time she spent in the bathroom was devoted to some focused makeup. She didn't know how many students transferred to this school senior year, but she knew that she would definitely not be invisible. A thin layer of glistening, ruby-red lip gloss went on, then some old, chunky "super black" mascara. After that, she hurried on to stuff in breakfast before she had to get going.

She sat at an empty, round table with the light off; it was a few minutes before seven last time she checked, minutes before sunrise. In the bitingly cold fridge there was a half gallon of milk, and in the back of the pantry a nearly finished box of sweetened corn flakes. Their blandness curbed her appetite, but she ate laboriously as she saw a neon sky outside the window, radiating the colors of a rich flame. When she had finished, the bowl made its way to the empty sink, clinking loudly against the bottom as she slid back into her room to grab what she needed.

She wasn't wild about walking, but Saint Valentine's was only three blocks away: no hills, no bullshit. The air outside left a crawling cold sensation on her arms, and prominent goosebumps began to form. The sun was straining through trees in the distance and it would soon warm the pavement. Her black backpack was light, but far from stylish, as she'd forgotten about buying one until the last minute. It was an anticipatory skeleton of the school year to come: empty binders and dirtless fabric and pockets thirsty to be filled with little binder paper notes and found pencils.

The brass doorknob squeaked as she pulled it closed. A neighbor across the street was standing in his yard, taming a sun bleached sea-foam colored hose. She stepped in the squares of the sidewalk as Huddersfield began to emerge from its massive shadow. She saw no other school-goers; maybe their mommies and daddies drove them to school at a more understandable time. Her breath poured from her nose out into the sleepy neighborhood. She soon found herself standing on that rusty brick path outside a nervously bustling front door.

Inside, the ceiling was tall and lights that looked like they hadn't been changed in decades lit the main hall. She stepped to the side of the large room, pulling a folded piece of paper from a pocket in the backpack. Her class schedule. An obnoxiously loud group of girls screamed as they saw each other for the first time in three months. She wished they'd turn it down a little, as she was still sleepy. The paint on the cherished orange lockers was chipped. She unfolded the paper, decoded the script, then determined that her first class would be in room 773, Honors English, P. Wentz.


End file.
